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Tuesday, August 13, 2013

The wave of popular defiance and demonstrations across
the Middle East and North Africa parallels twidespread protest acrosss the
globe from Latin America to Asia against sports organisations’ mismanagement
and mega-events. It is driven by lack of confidence in institutions that have failed
to root out corruption and meet demands for justice, dignity and inclusiveness.
Huge expenditure on sports mega events like the 2014 World Cup in Brazil are catalysts
and platforms for protest; soccer fans often play key roles in the protests. As
a result, sports associations like governments should embrace the change that
protestors demand or risk being swept away by an irresistable tide.

The year 2011 was
marked by a wave of defiance that dispatched experts’ credibility to the garbage heap of
history. . Common wisdom held that Arabs
were too wealthy and afraid of their
autocrats to actively demand change; Russians were apathetic and had a soft
spot for the concept of a neo-czar; India’s middle class was politically too
disengaged; West Europeans were too old; Americans were oblivious to
differences of class and Chinese party apparatchiks too effective at repressing
dissent.

The Arabs in 2011; the Americans, Russians, Europeans, Indians and Chileans in 2012; and the Egyptians, Turks, Brazilians and Indonesians in 2013 proved the experts wrong.
They heralded what promises to be a decade of defiance, dissent and popular demand for change; in which people are willing and able to assert
their deep discontent in new and
powerful ways.

Global sports governance is not immune to the wave of
protests witness Brazil’s demonstrations against the 2014 World Cup, this
year’s protests during Bahrain’s F1 and the key role that militant soccer fans
played in the overthrow in 2011 of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak and the
recent rejection of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s majoritarian
governance as well protests over the
politics underlying the country's soccer matchfixing scandal. If anything, the
problems of global sports governance mirror issues underlying the more general
wave of protests.

What has sparked protest ranges from public transportation
costs and the fate of iconic trees to lack of economic opportunity and the
choking grip of autocrats. Yet, underlying the wave of protests are common
factors that concern not only political leaders and economic elites but also global
sports managers. Among them:

a lack of confidence in existing institutions, arising from

a perception of political, economic and social (sports) leadership that fails to listen and are not held to account for wrong decisions, misguided policies and improper or mis-management;

failure to root out corruption at all levels of political, economic and social leadership, and

a perception that economic progress has failed to ensure that infrastructure as well as health and education facilities do not trail the lifting of huge numbers out of poverty; and

a demand for social justice, dignity and inclusiveness.

“FIFA rules nations”

The fact that virtually all protests and popular revolts are urban middle class in nature and claim a stake in shaping their urban environment and cultural identity has far-reaching consequences for sports managers and regional and global sports associations and the staging of mega events. The references of various Brazilian protesters to the 2014 World Cup should constitute a wake-up call, such as:

“The World Cup perpetuates our urban crisis. We have become disenfranchised consumers.

“We live in cities that operate on profit in which residents are not consulted. People are fed up with not having a say.”

“The real president of our country is FIFA. FIFA comes to our country, sets up a state within a state, and leaves.”

Lack of confidence in institutions is reinforced by the
frequent initial knee-jerk deployment of police and security forces to control
if not quell protest in which sports fans and particularly soccer fans are
often in the forefront. The use of indiscriminate police force swells protests
that frequently are initially focused on a specific issue. It lifts the lid on
far broader, deeply felt, pent-up anger and frustration and as demonstrated in the
case of Brazil and Turkey makes it difficult to put the lid back on. Sports associations like FIFA perceived as an elitist, closed old boy
network, that fails to tackle issues of corruption and mismanagement,
enforce its governance rules and maintain independence from political authority,
invariably become institutions whose
credibility is questioned.

In addition, the emergence of mega events like the World Cup
and the Olympic Games as platforms for campaigns for all kinds of rights –
human, labour, gender, national, ethnic and religious – increasingly empowers
activists, puts regional and international sports associations in the front
line and puts the associations as well as nations at risk of reputational
damage. This year’s Formula One public relations disaster in Bahrain, trade
union pressure on Qatar, controversy over Israel’s hosting of the FIFA Under-21
finals, last year’s successful International Olympic Committee (IOC) campaign
that forced three reluctant Muslim nations for the first time to field women
athletes at a global sporting event and the recent election of a Bahraini
soccer executive as president of the troubled Asian Football Confederation
prove the point.

The responses of Qatar, Bahrain, Israel and Saudi Arabia
have failed to gain them the upper hand in popular perception and coverage in
the media; both of which are dominated
by activists highlighting their failure to adhere to international standards of
human, labour and/or gender rights. Worse, hosting mega events and nominating
officials for regional and international office, has reinforced the negative
perceptions they were trying to dispel. Their failure has strengthened calls for such
rights to become key criteria in the awarding of future mega-events. It has
also rendered the separation of sports and politics a fiction and focused
attention on the need to develop systems that acknowledge the relationship but
eliminate conflict of interest,to ensure that it is not abused for partisan
political interests on an individual, national, regional and international
scale.

Sports governance: A sound policy prescription

If reputational damage and failure to achieve a key goal is
a host nation’s primary risk, activists may see such failure as a moral victory. Similarly, they are likely
to claim any progress such as an improvement of workers’ material labour and
living condition as a success even if they are unable to meet their ultimate
goal. The message for host countries and sports associations is: mega events
constitute a platform for showcasing both a country’s progress as well as its warts. The question potential
hosts have to ask themselves is what price are they willing to pay in terms of
reputational risk if they are not willing or able to address their
vulnerabilities. That question is all the more acute as international sports
bodies like FIFA are under pressure to make human, labour and women’s rights
part of the criteria for awarding events. In doing so, they are likely to raise
the barrier for a country’s chance of gaining the opportunity to host a major
event.

Proactive regional and international sports associations
would do well to have their ear close to the ground to understand a swelling global trend that
defines legitimacy, social justice and dignity as greater inclusivity,
transparency and accountability. Understanding this trend and its consequences
as it spills into the streets of the world’s capitals and major urban centers
involves a paradigm shift in sports management, including:

A recognition that sports
and politics are inextricably intertwined. Denial of this fact of life
undermines credibility and flies in the
face of reality. That reality is evident at every twist of the road from the
direct involvement of rulers, politicians and governments in the boards and
executive committees of regional and international sports associations to the
use of mega events by nations and governments to the role that global governing
bodies play in the legitimization of rulers. That recognition should lead to
the creation of a charter and/or code of conduct that governs the relationship
between sports and politics;

A revisiting of the
criteria for the awarding of mega events. This would involve inclusion of
international human, labour and gender standards in the awarding criteria as
well as greater public engagement in the national and urban decision making
process, enhanced transparency of the infrastructural requirements a host has
to meet and the terms of the agreement between the sports association and the
host. Sports associations will have to balance the infrastructural requirements
of a tournament with the long-term needs, cultural identity and popular aspirations
of host cities and ensure that its demands are in line and balanced with
overall urban and municipal policies rather than at the expense of. They will
have to also revisit their positioning as supra-national entities that are laws
unto themselves.

A restructuring of regional
and international sports associations that is governed by regulation of the
relationship between sports and politics, takes grassroots into considerations
and ensures that grassroots voices are heard, and enshrines independent oversight,
monitoring and auditing that gives credibility to combatting and preventing
abuse of power, mismanagement and corruption

This is a tall order that entails not only structural
adjustment but also a shift in the mental paradigm and a cultural transition.
It is not an agenda that can be achieved with a stroke of the pen and will
likely take significant time. It is likely to be a process that at times will
be bumpy. Bumps will include sports-related protests like those in Brazil and
often involve organized sports fans. Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff ensured
that her government was in front of the curve by recognising the legitimacy of
non-violent protests, describing them as an enhancement of her country’s
democracy and responding to protesters’ complaints. Her proactive approach like
that of Moroccan King Mohammed VI to the Arab Spring demonstrations in his
country offers sports associations and others a model. Others like Turkish
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and various deposed Arab leaders provide
cautionary tales.

The late economist Albert Hirschman argued that protest can
lead to “a new, more cohesive democratic order being produced.” Recognition of
the fact that non-violent protest is a pillar of a democratic, open and
pluralistic society places the risk of failing to have one’s ear to the ground
into perspective. Protest is no longer simply a disruptive element that
despoils a major event. Instead, events by becoming platforms in effect
contribute to the development of healthy societies. They are nevertheless also
events that frequently could have been avoided and made explosions of pent-up
anger and frustration less likely if public sentiment had been taken into
account earlier.

The decade between 9/11 and the first popular Arab revolts
in 2011 illustrates both the clarifying effect that protest has, even in its
most violent form, and the risk in failing to recognize and acknowledge
simmering discontent. That illustration contains lessons not only for
governments but also for managers at all levels, including those of regional
and national sports associations.

Proactive anticipation rather than defensive reaction

In the immediate aftermath of the Al Qaeda attacks on New
York and Washington in September 2001, government officials from then US
President George W. Bush down, think tanks pundits and the media blamed the
attacks on widespread discontent with repressive rule in the Middle East. That
assumption was reinforced by recognition that a policy that gave priority to
stability by supporting autocratic regimes rather than to ideals of dignity,
justice and economic opportunity had created the circumstances that made the
9/11 attacks possible.

In response, much attention was focused in the wake of 9/11
on the Arab street, the code word for public opinion in the Middle East and
North Africa. The expectation was that the Arab street would express its
aspirations. Attention to the street diminished when it did not live up to the
expectations of officials, analysts and journalists who began to deride those
who stressed the need to be more attentive to Arab public opinion. Like the
autocratic regimes against whom they revolted, Western officials, analysts and
journalists wrote off a whole generation and class.

In reality however, while the change in mood in Western
capitals was a reaction to the fact that the Arab street did not conform to the
West’s time frame, nothing on the ground had changed. Pent-up anger and
frustration had not dissipated. On the contrary, it continued to fester and
boil at the surface. It was noticeable to anyone who put his ear to the ground.
The only thing that was not predictable was what would cause that anger to boil
over and when that might happen.

It should have been clear from the outset that once Tunisian
fruit vendor Mohamed Bouazizi's suicide on the doorstep of the governor’s
office went viral, his cry was not
simply one for justice, freedom and economic opportunity but, first and
foremost, an act of desperation in the face of humiliation, a cry for dignity
that resonated with the masses across the region as well as around the globe.
From Sao Paulo to Istanbul and from New York to Cairo the outcry was against
the indignity of crony capitalism and neo-liberalism which ensured that rules
are rigged in favour of elites, to the
disadvantage of the middle classes. For
Bouazizi and the millions in the Middle East and North Africa whom he inspired,
it was the daily humiliation and police brutality meted out by repressive
autocratic officials and their cronies that dominated their ordinary lives

Theirs is a massive denunciation of years of political and
institutional decay, the voices of long-standing criticism of the status quo as
well as the generational desire for political change and safeguards of
democratic freedoms rather than the expression of new ideas. At times, the
denunciation is preceded by the emergence of political groupings that are as
much characterized by discontent with the status quo as they are by ideology.
In Egypt it was the Kefaya (Enough) movement that pioneered the use of social
media, mastered the art of symbolic demonstrations and carved out space in the
media; in the United States it was the Tea Party, a populist and libertarian
movement that opposed the US Troubled Asset Relief Progrm; in India the uproar
towards corrupt telecommunications licence auctions; and in Europe the electoral turn towards far
right-wing and green political parties.

In virtually all cases – Occupy Wall Street, the anti-Putin
demonstrations in Russia and the series of revolts sweeping the Middle East and
North Africa -- the instigators were more often than not young, middle class
and educated with no prior political affiliations driven by a globally shared
perception that their political and economic systems were broken. Unlike the
1989 demise of communism their protests are sparked by a sense of
disintegration across society not just at the system’s nerve center. Perhaps
the most apt comparison for 2011 as a Year of Protest is the 1848 revolt in
Paris that abolished the monarchy and established the French republic. Like in
1848 when a small act of protest mushroomed into a mass movement fuelled by
technological advance of the time -- telegraphy, railroads and printing presses
– current protests are enabled by the Internet, social media and technology
that circumvents censorship and enables free communications.

In the Arab world, it was the cannon fodder – the Mohamed
Bouazizis or shabab (youth) of the Middle East and North Africa – that lost the
most blood in revolts and displayed the most bravery because they had the least
to lose. While religion may be a major influence in their lives, electoral
politics despite the emergence of Islamist forces, has not provided the channel
for the pursuit of their political ambitions.

That is largely because they,
like many protesters across the globe, are driven by what they don’t want
rather than any concept of what they
want as is evident in Egypt and Turkey.

The protests represent an irreversible trend despite the fact
that protest and revolution more often than not follow Lenin’s principle of one
step forward, two steps back. Nonetheless, for governments as well as for
sports associations the choice is proactively embracing the kind of changes
that address protesters’ fundamental concerns or being taken by surprise and
possibly being swept away by a tidal wave that has proven to be irresistible.

James M. Dorsey is a Senior Fellow at the S. Rajaratnam
School of International Studies as Nanyang Technological University in
Singapore, co-director of the Institute of Fan Culture of the University of
Würzburg, and the author of the blog, The Turbulent World of Middle East
Soccer.

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About Me

James M DorseyWelcome to The Turbulent World of Middle East Soccer by James M. Dorsey, a senior fellow at Nanyang Technological University’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies. Soccer in the Middle East and North Africa is played as much on as off the pitch. Stadiums are a symbol of the battle for political freedom; economic opportunity; ethnic, religious and national identity; and gender rights. Alongside the mosque, the stadium was until the Arab revolt erupted in late 2010 the only alternative public space for venting pent-up anger and frustration. It was the training ground in countries like Egypt and Tunisia where militant fans prepared for a day in which their organization and street battle experience would serve them in the showdown with autocratic rulers. Soccer has its own unique thrill – a high-stakes game of cat and mouse between militants and security forces and a struggle for a trophy grander than the FIFA World Cup: the future of a region. This blog explores the role of soccer at a time of transition from autocratic rule to a more open society. It also features James’s daily political comment on the region’s developments. Contact: incoherentblog@gmail.comView my complete profile